The Stranger
by IshipALLTHETHINGS
Summary: During the first annual Weirdmageddon celebration, Dipper and Mabel notice that there is a stranger in the crowd. Who is she? And why does everyone seem to know her?


Author's notes

This was a request of Dipper and Mabel meeting Wendy's mom.

* * *

Dipper frowned at Mabel. Her eyes were as dull as his but she wore a smile for everyone. The Pines twins were standing on a sidewalk, watching the people of Gravity Falls set up for their first annual Weirdmageddon celebration. Mayor Tyler for some ludicrous reason, thought was a good idea to have a party to celebrate the vanquishing of Bill and his plot to take over the universe. Dipper could understand the sentiment of proving that the people of Gravity Falls were strong enough to move on from the horrors they experienced during that insane time. He could really understand the theory. On paper. But to actually see people close off roads and set up booths with Weirdmageddon themed games put a sour taste in his mouth. And glancing around he saw the same looks of distaste trying to be hidden on the other townsfolk.

"Seriously?" Dipper muttered. He nudged Mabel's arm and pointed at one of the booths. It was one of those water gun gaming booths but his eyes focused on the targets. They were all crude cutouts of Bill and the eye was the target. "How can people actually want this stuff?"

Mabel grimaced at the targets and shrugged. "At least the prizes are normal."

Normal wasn't the word Dipper would have used to describe the prizes. They were all plushies of the various magical creatures of Gravity Falls. But Dipper did get what Mabel meant. At least the toys were all of the friendly magical creatures and not Bill's buddies.

Dipper was about to point out another game featuring Bill as a target, it was one of the dunking booths, when Mabel gasped. "Who's that?" she exclaimed, pointing to the right of the two.

Dipper followed his twin's finger and saw who she was talking about. There was a woman in the crowd who looked as lost as the other townsfolk. She couldn't be more than Wendy's height and she was as lithe as her. She was wearing a forest green dress, a pair of eyeglasses adorning her green eyes. The woman was laughing at something Mayor Cutebiker was saying to her, a hand clasped at his shoulder as if they were old friends. More than once she had to push back her beret lest it leaned too far forward and obscure her eyes.

The younger Pines twin frowned as he continued to study her. "I don't know," he admitted. His fingers searched for the pencil he kept in his pocket and brought it out to chew on the end. Dipper didn't miss the worried look Mabel gave him but he ignored it. "I don't know," he repeated, his eyes narrowing.

"Dip," Mabel said slowly, grasping the arm that held the pencil to his mouth. "It's okay. We're okay."

"No," Dipper remarked, allowing his sister to gently push the arm down so the pencil popped out of his mouth. "I literally never seen her before. Not in Weirdmageddon or anywhere else. She's new," he said suspiciously. He glanced at Mabel and noticed the scared look she had on her face. He covered her hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. "We're okay," Dipper repeated her own words. "I just want to see if she's human, that's all."

"That's all," Mabel echoed as she gave a tight nod. She gave the stranger a quick glance to confirm she was actually there and wasn't a part of a hallucination. Mabel took a deep breath and her eyes filled with determination.

Dipper tapped Mabel's shoulder and together, the two walked into the crowd. It took them ten minutes to find Grunkle Stan. The old man was eating a hot dog, glaring at the different Bill targets. The twins remembered how he yelled at the suggested celebration when Mayor Cutebiker first brought it up. After, he had walked off on his own, saying he needed fresh air and some time to think.

"Hey Grunkle Stan," Mabel greeted in her usual cheerful tone.

Grunkle Stan tore his gaze from the dunk tank to try to smile down at Mabel. It was a horrid look but neither twin pointed it out. "Hey kiddo, how are you enjoying the festival?" His forced expression cracked on the last word and some of the venom leaked into his voice.

Again both twins ignored it. "Great!" Mabel lied. "Dip and I were just hanging around."

Dipper tuned the rest of the small talk out as he looked back at the stranger. Now the woman was chatting with Manly Dan. For some reason, Manly Dan was grinning a lot. That was certainty peculiar. "Hey, Grunkle Stan," Dipper interrupted whatever Mabel was saying. He gestured to the woman. "Who's that?"

Grunkle Stan looked confused for a moment before realization spread on his face. "Oh that's Ava!" He looked back at the children, his expression now worried. "Why are you two asking? Did she mention me?" Grunkle Stan quickly added, taking a step back, his eyes flashing to Ava. "She can't prove anything! I-I got to go." Without saying goodbye to Mabel or Dipper, Grunkle Stan turned and bolted into the crowd. The twins lost sight of him within moments.

"That was weird," Dipper said slowly, his suspicions rising. He gave the woman a calculating glance. "What did she do to make Grunkle Stan so worried?"

Mabel shrugged and gave Dipper's shoulder a soft punch. Even though she was grinning again it did not meet her eyes. "There's probably a lot of people who Grunkle Stan wants to hide from. He isn't really popular."

Dipper only gave a hum to that explanation. There was something familiar about this Ava woman that he couldn't put his finger on. "Come on, I want to see what's up."

Mabel looked like she wanted to try to dissuade him but with a glance at the determined look on his face she nodded.

The Pines Twin started to follow Ava around, making sure to blend into the crowd as best as they could. The woman didn't seem to notice the two as she chatted with the Gravity Falls' residents.

Dipper kept track of who Ava talked to and about what. She congratulated the two officers on their marriage, she shared a few kind words with Lazy Susan, and she even pulled Old Man McGucket into a tight hug and they talked about his contraptions for twelve minutes. Each person Ava talked made Dipper more and more suspicious. It was like she knew everyone in Gravity Falls but not once did he ever hear anything about this Ava woman. He wished he still had those journals, surely at least one of them would offer some feasible explanation.

The sun was only starting to set when Ava broke off her conversation with Tad Strange to start heading towards the stage set up at the end of the street. There was a podium where Mayor Cutebiker was standing, shuffling through some note cards. A cannon was at the ready a few feet away from him. Ava stood at the side of the stage where the stairs led up to the platform.

"Good evening everybody!" Mayor Cutebiker greeted the town's people with a wave. Soon, the conversations hushed and everyone was watching him. "On this day a year ago that nasty Triangle Man came into our dimension and tried to take over our world." Only a few residents gave nervous chuckles to Mayor Cutebiker's naming of Bill Cipher. "We sure showed him and his icky friends what we're made of!" This time there were a few cheers, the loudest coming from Manly Dan. "We set up this little celebration to remember the hardships we all faced and the courage of those ten that saved our town and our world." Dipper never heard or seen Mayor Cutebiker this serious before. There was no humor in his eyes when his met Dipper's and his voice was steady and strong. "To those ten, I and everyone in Gravity Falls, human or otherwise, thank you for your service."

Dipper could feel almost everyone's eyes on him, including Ava's. His palms were suddenly slick with sweat and he swallowed past the lump in his throat. He almost missed seeing Ava walk onto the stage, a lit cigar in her mouth. Mayor Cutebiker gave the cigar a distasteful glance but he did not voice any complaints when she took it out of her mouth and lit the cannon's fuse with the burning end. There was a gleeful smile on her face as the fuse burned down and the cannon fired. A cannonball shot out and the town's people followed its path with their eyes until it was out of sight well away from them. Several trees shuddered where the cannonball struck true a mile away from the crowd. Ava bowed and quickly walked off the stage, the cigar back in her mouth.

"That's so cool!" Mabel gasped. Apparently Ava lighting the cannon with her cigar was enough to convince the older Pines twin that she wasn't a monster hiding in Gravity Falls.

"Yeah, I think so too."

Dipper and Mabel whirled around at the voice. Wendy raised an eyebrow at the twins as she took another bite from her blue cotton candy. "What's up?" she asked, her mouth full.

"Nothing," Dipper said just as Mabel answered, "Dipper thinks Ava might be a creature from another dimension."

Wendy stared at the twins for a moment and then the words were processed in her head. She choked on the cotton candy that was still in her mouth. Mabel thumped on her back and soon Wendy waved her off, gulping mouthful of air in between her laughter. "What?" she asked as she wiped away a tear from her cheek.

"Everyone seems to know her and we never saw her or even heard of her!" Dipper explained, slightly offended by Wendy's reaction. After everything she had been through, Wendy should take this more seriously.

"Well yeah, she wasn't around when you two were staying here last summer," Wendy said with a roll of her eyes. She looked at where Ava was smoking her cigar off on the sidelines and then down at the twins. "I'll introduce you to her." Before Dipper could tell Wendy not to, Wendy was already waving the older woman over to the three.

Ava caught sight of them and smiled as she walked towards the three. Dipper didn't have enough time to think of a way to get him, Mabel, and Wendy out of the situation before Ava was standing before them, looking down at Mabel and Dipper.

"You two must be Dipper and Mabel." Whenever Ava blew out a puff of smoke, she tilted her head away from the others. Dipper noticed that the smoke clouds stuck too close together to be natural. And he could have sworn that just for a moment he saw a shooting star and a pine tree in the clouds before the smoke dissipated. When Ava moved the cigar back to her mouth, the label's symbol caught his eye. It was wolf's head but the animal had three eyes instead of two and the entire symbol appeared blurry like it was made out of smoke.

Ava didn't wait for a response before continuing."I heard all about you two from Wendy," Ava continued, "especially you, Dipper." Before the twins could react, Ava pulled them into a tight hug. This time, the beret was pushed off her head and fell to the ground but no one made a mode to snatch it. "Thank you," she whispered. From the tone of her voice, Dipper could tell she was close to crying. When Ava pulled back after a few seconds, she grabbed her hat and put it on, fiddling with it a few seconds to make sure it was on just right. When it was perfectly situated on her head, Ava cleared her throat and blinked several times to hide the fact that tears formed in her eyes.

Dipper was blushing wildly as he grasped for words. "For what?" he stammered.

Ava was grinning at them, gratitude shining in her green eyes. "For everything during Weirdpocalypse."

"Weirdmageddon," Wendy corrected, a slight embarrassed flush on her face.

Ava nodded. "Yes, Weirdmageddon. You two helped save my family and protect my daughter."

"I wasn't the one who needed protection!" Wendy immediately protested. "I was the one who helped fight off Bill and rescue Ford."

While Wendy was talking, the points were connecting in Dipper's mind. "Daughter?" he repeated and everything became clear just as it did for Mabel.

Mabel pointed at Ava and Wendy, gasping as her eyes flashed between them. "Ava's your mom! Wendy's your daughter!"

"Why haven't we seen you around in Gravity Falls?" Dipper asked Ava. It still didn't make perfect sense to him and he needed to understand all the facts.

Ava shrugged. "I'm a demolition expert and Gravity Falls doesn't really need anything needing to be blown up." She took a long drag from her cigar and this time, the smoke cloud appeared to dissipate violently as if it were an explosion.

Mabel pouted at Ava. "We could have used someone like you during Weirdmageddon. You could have added explosives to the Mystery Shack mech."

Ava appeared to consider the words. "Perhaps but I wouldn't recommend it. I'm good at blowing things up, not creating rocket launchers." She turned her head to look at Manly Dan who was punching the dunk tank's target. "When I heard about what happened from Dan, I came right back." She turned her gaze back to Dipper. "I see my daughter gave you my hat."

Dipper was thrown by the sudden change in topic and his right hand instinctively went up to finger one of the ear flaps. "This was your hat?" He had always assumed only Wendy owned it before him. It was one of the reasons why it was so special to him.

"Dan gave it to me the day I found out I was pregnant with Wendy," Ava said, sighing happily at the memories. "She used to wear it all time when she was a little baby. Sometimes when she was fussing about us dressing her, she would only wear the hat."

Wendy quickly spoke up. "Uh, we don't need to hear that!" Her face was almost as red as her hair. "Why don't you tell Dipper about the time you saw those demon cave monsters in Brazil."

Dipper gaped at Ava who was frowning at Wendy. "Now you believe me?" she asked her daughter. "You were always going 'yeah yeah' and ' _sure_ , mom' whenever I told you that story."

"Well that was before Weirdmeggadon," Wendy said defensively.

"You actually saw cave demons?" Dipper asked in an awed voice.

There was a smidge of smugness in Ava's voice as she said, "Oh yes. It was about five years ago and I was assigned to blow up some cave. Everyone that was previously assigned to the project quit soon enough and they were under contract to never say why." She flashed a grin that was eerily similar to the cocky smile Wendy had whenever she was about to sneak away from her work. "I found out why the first night when I went to have a quick look. There was a cave demon that kept disabling the equipment and attacking everyone that went into the cave to fix it." She turned her head to blow out another cloud of smoke. This time it took the shape of a humanoid with clawed hands and large wings.

Dipper looked as if he was given an early birthday present. "How big was its wingspan? Were you sure it was just one? Cave demons are notorious for dwelling together in one area. Did it attack you? Were you able to communicate with it? How was it able to disable your equipment? Did it know it was explosives? Did you chase it away? How?"

The questions just kept coming out of Dipper's mouth but Ava did not mind. She waited patiently for Dipper to run out of questions which did not seem to happen soon. Wendy and Mabel shared a look and both took a step away from the two.

Wendy struck her thumb to where there was a corn dog stand. "Want to see how many corn dogs I can eat in a minute?"

"I bet I can eat more!"

Mabel and Wendy left Dipper and Ava to discuss cave demon and explosives. By the time they came back with uncomfortably full stomachs, the two were still talking. It took another hour for Wendy and Mabel to break up the impromptu interview with a promise of having a dinner together a day after. Dipper only accepted when Mabel suggested that he could bring his tape-recorder to record Ava's first-hand account.


End file.
